Mystery bird...

[ian_g]

Hi all,

My parents have been in touch with me about a particular bird that has started to frequent their garden. Just to give you a little more insight before I cut and paste the email from my Mum, they live in quite a rural area, just outside of Bolton in Lancashire.

This is the description of the bird...

I mentioned to you about the birds which have suddenly appeared in our garden for the last 3 days. I have looked in our bird books and been on the RSPB identify a bird site and really we're no nearer discovering what they are. Here is the description:- a bit bigger than a goldfinch but not as large as a Greenfinch. Pale yellow/beige beak with grey tip and definitely a finches beak. It looks as though it's wearing black glasses. Its colouring is fabulous, from its head to its tail feathers it is striped in black and russet/orange (quite tiger-like) and these are vertical stripes going down the length of its body but then on its tail these stripes form a V. I don't know the leg colour as they always seem to be eating the Nyjer seeds and I can't see them. It's really frustrating as my zoom isn't functioning properly so I haven't taken a photo. Dad has taken a photo but his card reader is faulty so is saying there is nothing there to copy!! We can only take pics through the glass as the window doesn't open enough for us to take shots with it open. The nearest we can see it being is a Whinchat but that has a stripe of white over its eye and ours don't, the Twite has some of the right things but a lot that aren't!! Suggestions gratefully received.

Can anyone help so that my parents stop having restless nights wondering what it is?!

Many thanks,
Ian G

[caernerch]

try siskin
regards
caernerch

[ian_g]

Thanks for your suggestion, caernerch, unfortunately it's not that

[RobS]

Could be anything. Perhaps juveniles of a species. Brambling? Redpoll? Chaffinch?

Failing that perhaps it's a load of escapes - without a picture it's very difficult to say.....or is this a wind up?

Rob S

[Jonners]

Hi Ian. Sounds like a Brambling to me. Try looking at winter plumage male

[rossy]

try hawfinch, rossy.

[ian_g]

Originally Posted by RobS

Could be anything. Perhaps juveniles of a species. Brambling? Redpoll? Chaffinch?

Failing that perhaps it's a load of escapes - without a picture it's very difficult to say.....or is this a wind up?

Rob S

No, no wind up. I'm hoping that she'll be able to take a photograph some time soon!

[ian_g]

Thanks Jonners and Rossy (Jonathan Ross even!).
I've sent a text over so she can make comparisons.

[Picidae]

agree Brambling sounds a good possibility although it doesn't have 'vertical' stripes down back. If not, try male Reed Bunting, they can produce quite strange head patterns this time of year and are beginning to disperse to winter stubble/seed eating venues and have certainly be known to visit garden feeders (probably looks more like a Whinchat superficially than a Brambling, just a thought)

http://www.istockphoto.com/file_thum...choeniclus.jpg

http://www.charliesbirdblog.com/~cha...10/reed000.jpg

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Mr_q5Idw9_...+side+good.jpg

[IanR]

Hi ya Google coloured canaries you'll be surprised at the variety.